


Grand Gestures

by MechBull



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-05
Updated: 2016-05-05
Packaged: 2018-06-06 13:18:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6755677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MechBull/pseuds/MechBull
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Love is my religion - I could die for that - I could die for you...My love is selfish - I cannot breathe without you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Grand Gestures

**Author's Note:**

> 1) I just quoted Keats in that summary. How pretentious. I apologize.  
> 2) I can ONLY hope the writers are going somewhere with their pointed little comments to each other, but I’m too impatient to wait that long. Here’s my rather melodramatic version of that conversation.

Jemma closed her eyes, snuggling back against Fitz. He was exactly the right size for spooning, and it had quickly become one of her favorite ways for them to rest together as they calmed after more…athletic activities in bed. Jemma smiled a secret smile at that thought and then sighed.

“I suppose,” she observed.

Fitz whined in protest, wrapping his arm around her tighter and pulling her closer.

“No,” he said, the pout in his voice clear.

He wasn’t the only one finding it harder and harder to separate at times like this. But…

“I really should go back to my room.”

“You should just agree to move in.”

Jemma smiled. He had asked almost immediately, and she knew her real objection should be that it seemed awfully sudden, even considering their resolution not to waste any more time. Truthfully, she only had one concern. 

She voiced it again as she turned around in his arms to face him. “We’d have to tell Coulson and…everyone.”

“Pretty sure we’d just be confirming what everyone already knows. I wouldn’t be surprised if Hu – Hunter had set up a pool.”

Jemma’s brief smile was bittersweet. “Still,” she finally replied, “it wouldn’t be _our_ relationship anymore then. Everyone would have comments and opinions and quote-unquote advice. We wouldn’t have any sort of privacy to just enjoy being together.”

“We’d bloody well make time,” Fitz said with almost excessive innuendo and an expressive eyebrow waggle. 

Jemma laughed, leaning closer and tucking her head beneath his chin. Then she sighed again.

“I should at least go check on Lincoln,” she pointed out, adding beneath her breath, “The idiot.”

The statement apparently wasn’t quiet enough, based on how Fitz tensed up. After a heavy pause, he muttered, “Why don’t you just say whatever it is you want to say?”

Jemma hesitated for all of a moment, then shrugged. “Would it do any good? If…a situation came up, would you stop or think twice or – ”

“No.”

Jemma rolled away from his embrace, turning her back on him as she sat up. “That’s why. It’s a fight neither of us will win because neither of us will concede.”

“Just a little while ago,” Fitz pointed out testily, “you said yourself that – diving through a hole in the universe for you was – was – and now it’s apparently being, and I quote, a lovesick fool.”

Jemma shook her head, turning around again to face him. “I didn’t say that to imply that to be, I don’t know, _worthy_ of me meant you had to risk your life. I said it because you were comparing yourself to him, and I wanted you to see no comparison was needed. There was never a competition. Or if there was, you’d already won it a thousand times over – because of who you _are_ , not because you’re willing to die to prove yourself.”

“Except you also said you lo – ” Fitz shook his head, pressing his lips together briefly. “Doesn’t matter. Not the point. Point is, like I said, I can’t live in a world without you. You can’t expect me not to do _everything_ in my power – ”

“I feel the same way!” Jemma shouted, flinging her hands up. “I feel the same way,” she repeated, softer. “And I certainly wouldn’t be able to live with the doubt of whether there was something I could have done differently to protect or, or, or stop you. The martyr gets the easy way out; everyone else has to pick up the broken pieces.”

Fitz exhaled loudly in frustration, and Jemma licked her lips, shaking her head. She rose quickly to her knees, shuffling forward to put her hands on his cheeks and force him to look at her.

“Fitz. Fitz, do you realize – Will, all those people Andrew killed, what happened to you in that bloody pod – for what? For _me_? I’m not _worth_ it, and I can barely stand to look at myself in the mirror with all of that hanging over me as it is. If you – if you were to – ”

“You _are_ worth it,” Fitz argued, moving quickly to wrap his arms around her and pull her close. “This isn’t abstract, you know, Jemma. This isn’t just some…macho need to be the manliest hero you know or something. I saw you fall off the cargo ramp into open sky. I saw you stuck on the bottom of the ocean and I heard you screaming in pain from torture. I lived without you for months when you were at Hydra and again when you were sucked onto another planet and both were the worst times of my life. I – I need you, Jemma. I _love_ you, and you can’t ask me to just…do nothing.”

Jemma’s smile was wobbly, her lips wet with tears as she kissed him. “This is what I’ll ask from you then,” she whispered once she’d backed away just enough to rest her forehead against his. “You…Fitz, you’ve shown me how much you love me so many times through sacrifice. Now I want you to show it to me through selfishness. I want you to grasp on and hold tight to everything we could be to each other. I want you to promise me you’ll show me you love me by fighting for every second we have together. Don’t die for me; _live_ with me. I don’t want a name etched on a stone somewhere; I want a partner and a best friend and a – a husband.”

After a long pause, Fitz cleared his throat. He tilted his head back so she’d be forced to look at him. “You ask a girl to move in with you and she immediately starts talking marriage. Slow your roll, Simmons.”

Jemma burst into laughter. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she sniffed loudly and pulled him into another kiss. It only took a few moments before it became more passionate, and soon they were sliding back down onto the mattress with soft but urgent moans.

“Thought you had to check on Lincoln,” Fitz murmured between kisses.

“Eh, he’ll be fine. His system just had a little shock is all.”

Fitz groaned, this time not in pleasure, and backed away from her. “You did not just say that.”

Jemma grinned. “Milton always loved a good pun, you know.”

“Did he?” Fitz asked, scoffing lightly. “Well, for the record, Milton wouldn’t have survived a minute on Maveth. Not without his inhaler and EpiPen.”

“Oh my God, that inhaler! I’d forgotten! Do you remember that – that sniffling sound he’d make after he used it?”

Fitz immediately responded with an impression that demonstrated he remembered vividly. By the time their laughter died down, Jemma’s sides ached but her heart felt lighter than it had in ages.

**Author's Note:**

> You'll notice that Fitz doesn't actually promise anything. I'll let you decide if that was a deliberate misdirection on his part. ;)


End file.
